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Posted by Kahlessa (Member # 3412) on March 08, 2007 05:13 AM :
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Here’s something else our team came up with while working on the contest.
Page 62 – “…when Einstein talked to Niels Bohr…” refers to their legendary debates on quantum physics in the 20s and 30s.
The discussions Bohr and Einstein had relate to Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle, which states that it is impossible to simultaneously determine both the position of an electron and its velocity, and how the principle relates to quantum physics.
Einstein had trouble with the idea that the universe was based on the uncertainty of quantum physics. It was during these debates that Einstein said, “God doesn’t play dice with the universe.” He couldn’t accept that the universe may be an uncertain and unpredictable place. He thought that it was simply a matter of knowledge. If we can’t predict something in the physical universe, it is because we don’t yet understand all the variables.
Einstein believed instead that the uncertainties exist only because we don’t know enough. There are hidden variable that we aren’t seeing yet, but one day we will discover them.
Bohr, on the other hand, accepted the idea that the universe was an uncertain and unpredictable thing. Most physicists sided with Bohr and his Copenhagen interpretation.
As Richard Feynman said, “We do not know how to predict what would happen in a given circumstance, and we believe now that it is impossible, that the only thing that can be predicted is the probability of different events.”
This change in science is mentioned in Jurassic Park by Ian Malcolm on p. 160:
“They believed that prediction was just a function of keeping track of things. If you knew enough, you could predict anything.”
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Posted by DudleyB (Member # 2766) on March 08, 2007 07:24 AM :
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There's also the issue as to whether or not the position and momentum have a specific value or not or whether it is simply immeasurable and whether or not this is due to the presence of the observer. It's not as cut and dry as it is often presented: Einstein was "old school" and Bohn was "open-minded" and "new school." Bohr liked to blur the distinction between the physical and the metaphysical one minute and then disparage the metaphysical when it suited his purpose another minute. He liked to have his cake and eat it too. Prof. E. T. Jaynes wrote quite cogently on the subject. I have a pdf of his chapter on Probability in Quantum Theory if anyone would like to have it.
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Posted by truthiness (Member # 5876) on March 08, 2007 11:38 AM :
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Fortunately, mathematicians have developed the probability theories / functions / principles / mathematics, to help people "manage" uncertainty, until the day we might learn enough to predict anything / everything.
The utilization of probability functions allows us to represent complex systems as bulk functions with simple coefficients. Imagine trying to do chemistry by trying to know what every atom was doing, when you can just measure bulk parameters of heat / mass conversion over time, then extrapolate to industrial scale, which we've done for the last few hundred years. Do you even need to know the exact chemistry / physics of water to build a working steam engine? You may need it to perfect a steam engine, but not to build a functional one.
The 20th century science / mathematics of probability theory has allowed us to do a lot without knowing everything. I am surprised that Eistein was so closed minded / short sighted, when presented such an obvious tool for approaching science. Especially when he cries "relativity" to duck explaining what really happens to light between emitter / receiver, so that he can just explain observed effects without the larger system being defined. It seems dark energy will have to fill in the holes in his theories.
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Posted by DudleyB (Member # 2766) on March 09, 2007 08:32 AM :
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You make a good point. Even though there are a good many things I don't understand to my satisfaction, that doesn't paralyze me. I keep working with what I have; and I don't lose too much sleep at night over it. This isn't the case with everyone. The philosophical argument over the position and momentum of a particle being not completely knowable [just accepting this for the moment without arguing over that issue as well]: is this because it can't be measured for practical reasons or because it doesn't exist or have a specific value to be measured. The first is a physical issue. The second is a metaphysical issue. This is what the argument was about.
If you read descriptions of the EPR Paradox written by those who subscribe to the Copenhagen Interpretation, you will encounter phrases like, "the electron seems to know more than it should," and "even before Bob takes his measurement, his electron knows that it's spin must be opposite of Alice's electron." I have bad news for Bohr and his followers, Alice's and Bob's electrons don't know squat and don't care.
If you actually believe that a pair of electrons having opposite spin can be separated by an infinite distance, one flipped, and the other one will *instantaneously* also flip, then you've left the realm of science. You've entered the realm of Bilbo, Frodo, Gandalf, and Precious has a Ring. Physical forces don't operate over infinite distances and inertia prevents real particles from responding to any force instantaneously. Einstein wasn't the loony one. Bohr should have been in the funny farm.
When your experiments keep coming up with 1+1=3, you go back and re-think your experiments, you don't change the definition of 1, +, =, or 3. You've probably missed something. Just because you can write an equation for something and even if that equation agrees well with observations, that isn't sufficient to prove that the reasoning you used to come up with your equation accurately corresponds to the physical reality you're purporting to describe. If in your explanation you're insisting that the world is irrational and unknowable, then your explanation and your data must also be meaningless. You shoot yourself in the foot.
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Posted by The One (Member # 2600) on March 09, 2007 09:27 AM :
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This is interesting. But I think it goes down to the deep philosophical question: "What is matter? What is an atom made of?"
We know today that they are made up of some other smaller particles, but what are they made of? Unless we know the answer to that question, we will not be able to answer the above question...
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Posted by DudleyB (Member # 2766) on March 09, 2007 09:39 AM :
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You are so right! After all, what is a force anyway? How is it that a force can work without actually touching a thing? These are basic, but very important questions. We can't adequately answer them; but we must not let that paralyze us or drive us to becoming irrational--which, as I've said, is just a temper tantrum; because we can't have what we want right now.
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Posted by DudleyB (Member # 2766) on March 09, 2007 09:51 AM :
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By the way, I agree with Malcom in Jurassic Park, not because he cites Feynman's understanding of Bohr's concept of non-reality. I think the scientists were foolish to think they could control what they were doing, just like I think it's foolish to be inserting human DNA into mice. [Yes, we've been doing it for years.] Not that I think they're going to be successful at creating "Mrs. Frisbie and the Rats of NIMH;" but can you imagine what would happen if rodents got any smarter! Malcom identifies the problem: arrogance.
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Posted by truthiness (Member # 5876) on March 09, 2007 08:42 PM :
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Ah, forces, which is why I referred to dark matter / energy. Check out Halton Arp's website on gravity, in which he explains how gravity's effects seem to occur at distances faster than the speed of light.
I believe that we will realize (discover, prove) that gravity is actually a pressure / pushing force applied by some type of "graviton particle (dark matter / energy)", and not magically at some distance eminating from / between bodies, which travels many times faster than the speed of light.
Personally, I also believe that some component of red shift (maybe all) is due to dark matter / energy sapping energy from photons over time. More time / distance, more energy lost by photons.
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Posted by The One (Member # 2600) on March 11, 2007 08:49 AM :
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Dudley, you quite correctly put it. Sometimes, humans are arrogant beyond imagination! And that's the problem.
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Posted by Oleg L Gubarev (Member # 5695) on March 11, 2007 01:46 PM :
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My view,
dear friends,
that main problem is that discoveries are maked by scientists, but used by politics and establichments (bureaucrats).
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Posted by DudleyB (Member # 2766) on March 12, 2007 07:18 AM :
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1) Wasn't the Gatling gun was invented by a surgeon who thought that it would be so horrible that it would put an end to war--or is that just a legend?
2) According to linear field theory there is no time delay in the application of a force due to the presence of a field. I don't know how this could be tested. You can't turn a gravitational field on and off. I don't think we can ramp a magnetic or electrical field fast enough or sense it over the noise at a great enough distance to matter. If Bob's electron flips maybe Alice's electron won't flop immediately if it's far enough away? How could we know anyway?
3) Whether gravity is a push or a pull is hard to answer. People who say, "oh, yes, it's this, or it's that; and you're just stupid!" haven't really thought about it adequately with an open mind, having put away their preconceived notions. I personally don't believe in gravitons; but an air-tight disproof of the pressure theory of gravity that doesn't have unprovable assumptions is illusive.
4) Ah, yes, dark matter and the impact it may have on photons. What a wide open subject! I wish I had lots of money and could bottle the stuff and put it in a laboratory and study it; but I'd never get the funding. If I got it, I'd never get extensions. I couldn't keep telling whoppers. All I could say in my yearly report would be, "this stuff is awesome! You've got to come and see it [or NOT]! Bring the fam! Of course, I still don't know what it is or how it works; but I'm still working on a few ideas."
5) Now, if I wanted to be famous, I'd write a little book, say 3000 pages, and entitle it something modest like, "An Extremely Brief Overview of the Big Bang," and I would use whole cloth to completely fabricate every minute detail of the origin of space, time, matter, energy, and order. I'd go on to explain what dark matter is and how it can be "seen" even though it can't be "seen" in the traditional sense [I would subtly hint that if you didn't understand this sentence then you're an idiot.]. Then I'd explain "bright" matter and how it can't be "seen" even though it can be "seen" in the traditional sense [Yes, you're an idiot once again.].
6) I want MC to write a book where the pompous windbag astrophysicist who is the self-proclaimed galactic expert on black holes gets the chance of a lifetime to be launched into space in order to explore one! Something goes wrong. The spaceship contract went to the lowest bidder: A. C. Murphy, Inc. Our hero/villain Prof. Schwarzschild Blowhard is sucked into the black hole and discovers that it's nothing like what he described in his NYT best seller. Instead, it turns out to be...
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Posted by truthiness (Member # 5876) on March 12, 2007 07:48 AM :
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dudley, great post, enjoyed it thoroughly ...
As for a pushing theory of gravity, I base my "belief" on an entropic approach. Repulsive forces are obvious, because it takes energy to keep two things in close proximity (pressure, collision, etc.), so everything has a tendency to stay apart, yet there are attractive "forces", which must somehow achieve a stable lower energy state, requiring energy to undo it.
If matter, which under normal circumstances prefers to move apart (due to entropy), instead, collects together, then there must be something pushing it together, like grease collected together in soapy water. I say this, because I don't believe in remote effects (gravitational fields, etc.) without some field carrier. Electromagnetic fields have corresponding currents, so gravitational fields must have some hidden carrier we haven't yet detected. Given the great distances, it just seems that a faster than light graviton must be interacting (colliding / pushing) matter.
I have no evidence, no equations, just a sense that an entropic thought process should lead to these conclusions.
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Posted by DudleyB (Member # 2766) on March 12, 2007 08:46 AM :
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You say it takes energy to keep things close together. This sounds like an ongoing process. Do you mean this in the sense that it requires power? in which case there would be dissipation and a change over time resulting in irreversibility and increased entropy?
The Moon is stuck to the Earth by gravity; but it's also bound by it's energy state. If it were free it would have more energy; or you would have to add energy to it in order to free it. Protons and neutrons are stuck in a nucleus; because they're similarly bound. You can look at the strong force that way.
I don't know that I'd describe these situations as requiring energy to keep them there. It's more like they're stuck there; because they lack a certain amount of energy; but they are in stable states; so I feel like the statement needs to be more qualified.
[ March 12, 2007, 10:48 AM: Message edited by: DudleyB ]
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Posted by truthiness (Member # 5876) on March 12, 2007 04:23 PM :
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Yes, when I wrote that previous statement, I realized that I would need several more paragraphs to qualify, and hoped to slide by, but you are right to cite those and other examples of "bound" objects in stable equilibrium.
Without gravity, gas clouds / particles / asteroids would disperse over time, because their collisions (pressure) would drive them apart (assuming they didn't fuse on impact), as entropy demands. Gravity counteracts entropy, so that collisions only can release heat into deep space.
Again, since I don't believe in force at a distance, it is far more likely to me that a non-zero energy / pressure exists around everything, which passes through everything and weakly interacts, and that weak interaction creates an imbalance between masses (more mass / more interaction, greater the imbalance) and accelerates them towards one another.
As for the stable "bonds" at the nuclear level, perhaps there are other force carriers at work there, scaled appropriately, or it becomes more a case of particle "geometry", that determines their interactions / orbits - still mulling that one.
The moon is actually escaping Earth's grip and will fly away in time, so it is not truely "stable". Either gravity drives bodies together in a decaying orbit, or they eventually escape - nothing in orbit is stable.
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Posted by DudleyB (Member # 2766) on March 13, 2007 01:33 PM :
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I'm not really following you on the gravity/entropy thing.
I wouldn't say that I don't believe in force at a distance. I'd say that the influence of Alice's electron on Bob's and vice versa diminishes proportional to the inverse of the square of the distance separating them, which at an infinite distance, would be far too weak for one to exert adequate force on the other to flip it over--at least in the physical world. In the world of Hobbits and Bohr, it's quite possible. No doubt, in such a world, if Alice's electron should sneeze, Bob's electron would exclaim, "gesundheit!" even at an infinite distance.
Have you ever seen a derivation showing that gravity is a remnant of the weak force? It leaves you scratching your head.
Seeing as the Earth rotates faster than the Moon revolves, the tides are slowing down the rotation of the Earth and speeding up the revolution of the Moon, thus transferring energy from the Earth to the Moon, ultimately leading to its freedom. Now there's a revolutionary thought!
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Posted by truthiness (Member # 5876) on March 13, 2007 09:05 PM :
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I guess one thing that bothers me about the supposed attraction and repulsion among and between electrons and protons, is that once they get in proximity, they don't annihilate, merge or touch, they fall into position either in the nucleus or in an electron shell. Once in these positions, the overall atom no longer has "charge".
It seems they must mutually "shadow" for one another, causing the appearance of attraction, but once they are located in the same "position" (protons in nucleus, and electron shell centered around the nucleus), their mutual shadowing cancels, creating the illusion of neutrality. If they were truly attracted to one another, they should annihilate, merge or touch, but they don't, they just occupy a mutual center.
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Posted by DudleyB (Member # 2766) on March 14, 2007 06:27 AM :
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An electron approaches a proton, it's drawn into the proton's field [They're mutual; but we can look at it this way.], their paths begin to bend [Linear and angular momentum is conserved, each in 3 dimensions.], and they begin an amazing "dance" which usually ends with a stable hydrogen atom. Photons, even smaller particles, may be emitted as part of this process; because of the availability of energy states. What happens if the paths are nearly co-linear? Well, you can create a neutron and some other cool stuff. It really does work. They do this at HERA all the time. You can read about it on the web.
As far as annihilating one another, you may be thinking of electrons and positrons.
[ March 14, 2007, 08:29 AM: Message edited by: DudleyB ]
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Posted by truthiness (Member # 5876) on March 14, 2007 03:26 PM :
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yes, I am familiar with anti-matter particles, just not wrapping my head around around the interactions between particles of matter - didn't know that protons and electrons can merge to create neutrons, so they do "merge", which clears up that concept. I assume, due to their "charge", positrons and electrons "attract" (and annihilate on contact).
As for conservation of angular momentum, it suggests an orbit, as opposed to a surface or shell - certainly the electron keeps spinning / oscillating, not sure about orbitting (like the dance analogy).
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Posted by DudleyB (Member # 2766) on March 27, 2007 08:54 AM :
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Here are a few snippets from Ann Coulter's 3/22/07 column:
quote{It's hard to imagine Niels Bohr responding to Albert Einstein's letter questioning quantum mechanics with a statement like: "If you continue to speak out, you won't live to see further quantum mechanics." ... A few years ago, The New York Times ran an article about the continuing furious debates among physicists about quantum mechanics ... Though he helped develop the theory ..., Einstein immediately set to work attacking it. MIT cosmologist Max Tegmark called the constant testing and arguing about quantum mechanics "a 75-year war."}end quote
I just didn't want you all to think that I was the only one who made a big deal about Albert's disagreement with Niels, the philosophical implications, and how it's still relevant today.
As I describe it, Einstein discovered something really cool about the physical universe. Then Bohr went totally off the deep end, came up with a metaphysical interpretation, and created a religion out of it!
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Posted by truthiness (Member # 5876) on March 27, 2007 11:54 PM :
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If Einstein had only taken exception to Niels Bohr, then I might somewhat agree your previous statement, but he also fought Hubble on the expanding universe. Eistein omitted the possibility of an expanding universe from his theory of relativity due to his own personal religion / belief system, then pounded Hubble for it, in spite of plenty of observation evidence.
In short, Einstein was a punk. Granted, he played around with equations through an inspired insight that light was a constant, but failed to explain what happens in absolute terms, not just relative terms (for instance, at what point does light get red/blue shifted, at emitter, in path or at observer, or at all three?). Outside of that, what Neils Bohr was able to conceive / demonstrate took a far greater amount of vision / imagination. Quantum mechanics in NOT a religion, but it does take vision.
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Posted by DudleyB (Member # 2766) on March 30, 2007 07:58 AM :
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I keep returning to this like an animal to a trap. There's a little voice that keeps saying, "you don't have to take the bait every time. Just let this one go." I'm drawn to the argument like an insect to a bug zapper. Someone please stop me! Mr. Hyde has taken over. I'm no longer responsible for my actions.
This is a good link that tells about the Hubble Constant:
http://csep10.phys.utk.edu/guidry/viole ... stant.html
This is how it starts out:
"The Hubble Constant (Ho) is one of the most important numbers in cosmology because it is needed to estimate the size and age of the Universe. This long-sought number indicates the rate at which the universe is expanding, from the primordial "Big Bang." The Hubble Constant can be used to determine the intrinsic brightness and masses of stars in nearby galaxies, examine those same properties in more distant galaxies and galaxy clusters, deduce the amount of dark matter present in the universe, obtain the scale size of faraway galaxy clusters, and serve as a test for theoretical cosmological models."
I honestly don't mean to be rude; but please pause for a moment of reflection on the above paragraph and try to remember that we're talking about a single empirically determined number. If the words "circular-reasoning" don't immediately come to mind I suggest you read Aristotle. If you can't bear to do that launch Excel, open Help, and read the topic "circular reference."
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Posted by Kahlessa A - 2 (Member # 3412) on March 31, 2007 08:07 PM :
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There’s an excellent book that just came out in February on this subject, Uncertainty: Einstein, Heisenberg, Bohr, and the Struggle for the Soul of Science by David Lindley.
Uncertainty book
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Posted by truthiness (Member # 5876) on April 01, 2007 12:59 PM :
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Saw an excellent documentary on PBS (?) in which a prof was giving lectures on the work of Planck, Bohr, Einstein, etc. regarding the history of discovering / describing the atom and subatomic particals.
Most interesting was the description of an electron's "position" as the result of a sum of normally distributed wave frequencies, which resulted in a normally distributed "partical position", which strikes me as the best "model" of this subatomic partical that I've seen.
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Posted by IanMalcom516 (Member # 5392) on April 01, 2007 06:39 PM :
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Backing away from science just a little, is the Unified Field Theory real? I ask here because I read a book called "The Einstein Papers" that have to with Einstein and Bohr's discussions and focused on this theory (it was a fictional book). I guess those discussions actually took place...
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Posted by DudleyB (Member # 2766) on April 02, 2007 05:59 AM :
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Bohr's atom and Schrödinger's wave equation were certainly great advances in our understanding of matter; but we must remember that these are abstract mathematical models of physical things, that is, they are analogies. Every analogy breaks down at some point. The electron isn't really in 6 (or an infinite number of) different places at the same time. We just treat it mathematically as if it were in order to get a grip on something we can't measure or fully comprehend. Bohr went off the deep end when he began to think that the electron really was in 6 different places at the same time. Do you see what I'm trying to say here? Sane people don't believe that particles actually are in 6 different places at the same time. Sane people say, "it seems to work pretty good if we treat it mathematically as if the particle were in more than one place at the same time, even though we know good and well it isn't. We know this is only a model of the real thing; and admit that it isn't perfect. It's just the best thing we have to work with right now." If that's what Bohr had said, I would have no problem with him; but that's not what Bohr said. This statement is one of humility. Bohr's is one of arrogance. I never have warmed up to arrogant people.
[ April 02, 2007, 09:52 AM: Message edited by: DudleyB ]
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Posted by truthiness (Member # 5876) on April 02, 2007 12:18 PM :
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No one should be attempting a unified field theory until they get gravity right. Theories / equations of gravity work at a solar system level, but don't work at a galactic level, so they need to be rethought. Personally, I lean towards Halton Arp's belief that gravity is a pushing force applied by faster than light particals that permeate space. When the science community works through gravity, THEN they can spend time trying to unify that force with the electro-magnetic, nuclear strong and nuclear weak forces.
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Posted by DudleyB (Member # 2766) on April 03, 2007 06:18 AM :
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I know I come across as cynical; but that's just part of the picture. I'm also tenacious. I have many works in progress that I haven't yet solved to my satisfaction. I'm still searching for the Green's Function that will solve one problem. I'm still searching for the variational statement that will yield a particular partial differential equation. I'm still trying to find an analytical solution or at least an infinite series that will converge to the numerical solution that I have for yet another problem. I have a shelf full of these.
I see the search for a Grand Unification Theory (GUT) or a Theory of Everything (TOE) [Don't you just love the acronyms!] as a nerd's version of wanting to climb Mt. Everest or reach the North Pole. Of course some humans will be drawn to this search, it's natural. It's ok to begin working toward these ends. Of course, we aren't going to get there until we understand the smaller things along the way better, like gravity. I agree with truthiness, we aren't going to make it to the summit until we know how to use the crampons and ice pick.
[ April 03, 2007, 08:20 AM: Message edited by: DudleyB ]
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Posted by Lucidity (Member # 4665) on April 19, 2007 07:08 PM :
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quote:
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Originally posted by DudleyB:
Prof. E. T. Jaynes wrote quite cogently on the subject. I have a pdf of his chapter on Probability in Quantum Theory if anyone would like to have it.
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I'd like to have it. Thanks.
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Posted by DudleyB (Member # 2766) on April 20, 2007 05:37 AM :
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here's a link
http://home.comcast.net/~dudley.benton/jaynes.pdf
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Posted by DudleyB (Member # 2766) on May 10, 2007 07:01 AM :
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There's an even more basic problem with Heisenberg's and Bohr's thinking than the nature of space... that of existence itself. That's why I say Heisenberg's and Bohr's problem is one of epistemology, not one of physics. The lord gods Heisenberg and Bohr and their disciples [That's what they were, founders of a new religion.] actually believe objects don't exist until and unless we reach out to measure them, then these objects spring into existence.
Electrons can also be in an infinite number of places at the same time, even in an infinite number of universes at the same time! Besides being more arrogant than Nero, these guys were crazier than Nero! It's one thing to realize that when we attempt to measure things we disturb them. It's quite another thing to have delusions that the existence of physical objects depend on our attention.
People grossly underestimate the impact philosophy has had on science. Modern philosophers were asking, "if a tree falls in the forest, and there's no one around to hear it, is there a sound?" [Wikipedia attributes this to 18th century philosopher George Berkeley.] Heisenberg and Bohr incorporated this nonsensical epistemology into their physics. That's what I mean when I say they discarded logic.
We now know that this epistemology [viz., Modern Philosophy] was wrong; because it proved to be hopelessly inadequate to answer any of the great philosophical questions. Therefore, it was subsequently and summarily discarded in favor of Post-Modern Philosophy, which was also proven to be hopelessly inadequate; and it too has been summarily discarded in favor of the current mess, which we're not quite sure what to call, "Post-Post-Modern Philosophy?"
Rest assured that this current pathetic drivel will not be up to the task of answering any philosophical questions, certainly not any great ones!
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Posted by DudleyB (Member # 2766) on May 11, 2007 08:49 PM :
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If we want to know what logic is we ask Aristotle. If we want to know what geometry is we ask Euclid. If we want to know what science is we ask Francis Bacon, whom I will now paraphrase:
We begin by making observations. From these we draw conclusions. Based on these conclusions we formulate hypotheses. In order to test our hypotheses we perform experiments, which we observe. We now evaluate and possibly modify our hypotheses, perform more experiments, and the process is repeated. Eventually, a hypothesis may rise to the status of theory, provided it is shown to be reasonably consistent--which doesn't mean that it won't be discarded later and replaced with a completely different hypothesis.
One thing is absolutely essential that distinguishes this process which we call the Scientific Method: the testing of hypotheses with experiments. Logic is also absolutely essential, as it's the track this process runs on; but logic isn't unique to the Scientific Method. If it doesn't involve experiments, it isn't scientific. That's not to say that it isn't significant, just that there are many things today that are passed off as scientific that aren't.
Science is the pursuit of knowledge using the Scientific Method--wherever that may lead. Naturalism is the philosophical belief system that all things have a natural [i.e., non-supernatural] origin. Many people today insist on substituting the definition of Naturalism for the definition of Science.
While it's quite true that no one has come up with experiments which test the supernatural, that's not the problem here, and Heisenberg and Bohr knew this quite well. Logic is the problem! It's logic that leads each and every one of us to the inescapable conclusion--through observation and experimentation, the Scientific Method, or what we call every day life--that there's no way all this is one big happy accident! So what did Heisenberg and Bohr do? They got rid of logic and reason!
That's right! They pawned one of our most valuable possessions, logic and reason, for 2 cents on the dollar, and burned the claim check, having no intentions of ever redeeming it, just so that they wouldn't have to face the obvious. Why didn't they want to face the obvious? because science is ontologically mute; and they wanted it to stay that way, by keeping logic's nose out of their personal business. But that was such a big mistake in so many ways--besides the obvious of no longer having a track for them to run on. Just like the old saw, "honesty is the best policy," so "consistency is also always the best policy." The New Pandora's Box that Heisenberg and Bohr opened by pawning logic and reason extends far beyond science. Their legacy has been toxic.
[ May 12, 2007, 07:41 AM: Message edited by: DudleyB ]
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Posted by DudleyB (Member # 2766) on May 14, 2007 02:00 PM :
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Logic is the track on which the Scientific Method runs. Experiments may be limited to the natural realm and are definitely restricted to the *here* and *now* [we can't perform an experiment on something that we can't get our hands on like creatures long extinct or black holes]; but logic is not so limited. Logic can extend to places where our arms can't reach and touch things that no hand can grasp. That's why things that aren't natural *aren't* necessarily off limits to scientific inquiry. That's also why we must be absolutely *consistent* with our logic, not allowing *anything* (like the toxic gruel cooked up by Hegel) to contaminate it. We're taking a very important journey on this track of logic and we certainly don't want any fecal coliforms in the drinking water before we even leave the station! [Historical inquiry is a horse of a different color! Maybe we'll get around to that someday. Don't you just love CSI!]
[ May 14, 2007, 04:58 PM: Message edited by: DudleyB ]
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